For My Dear Friend
by Atticus7497
Summary: Toushiro receives a gift from his past and makes him question everything he has known. how far will he go to find out the truth about his own past? and how will he handle people questioning his intelligence?
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: i do not own any part of bleach or any part of its franchise. all of the credit goes to the respective owners of the franchise and no copyright infringement was intended. the characters not related to the canon material of bleach are works of fiction and are in no way a reflection of any person, alive or dead, but are in fact works of my own imagination :D .**

**This is my first fan fiction and i hope you enjoy, i will post more chapters as i write them. please review! **

Chapter 1: The letter

"Hitsugaya-Taicho!" Shouted the voluptuous lieutenant Matsumoto Rangiku, excitedly bounding into the 10th squad's office noisily sliding the fasuma aside. She was searching for her dearly respected Captain, Hitsugaya Toushiro. She found him as expected sat behind his desk; he appeared deep in thought and was surrounded by tall stacks of paperwork that almost made the Lieutenant stop in her tracks. Far too excited to be fazed at how busy her Captain was, Matsumoto bounced on her feet as she waited to be addressed.

Toushiro tried to ignore her as best he could; He assumed she was going to ask him something trivial but he quickly became annoyed with her staring at him continuously. It was rather bothersome and off putting when he was trying to concentrate.

"Yes, Matsumoto, what is it now?" Said the Captain tiredly, in a less than impressed tone of voice as his brush hovered over the paper in front of him. "Can't you see I've got a stack of paperwork that I've got to complete after the last mess that you caused?" He pointed at the piles of paper stacked neatly around his desk with his calligraphy brush and returned to writing with a frown on his face. He couldn't get five minutes peace and if Matsumoto thought she was going to distract him then she was _wrong._

"Awww but Taichoooo, I've got you a present!" She smiled as she held up her gift for the Captain

He ignored her and to his great displeasure she stepped closer and he realized that, as usual, she would not go away until she had said what she wanted. He took a deep breath and prepared himself for her nonsense talk about... Whatever it was she normally blathered on about. He glanced up and to his surprise in her hand was an old, tattered, leather bound book with a metallic clasp sealing the pages together and along with it was a worn letter addressed to him that looked as if it had been sealed hastily.

"Fine," He sighed, looking back at his documents. "Leave it over on the table over there, I need to get back to my-"

"It's not like the other presents I've gotten you, sir," Matsumoto promised but her Captain just tutted and looked like he didn't believe her. "No, honestly, this one came from the depths of the 3rd Squad's barracks after Kira was clearing out the leftovers of Ichimaru's departure. It's a book and a letter addressed to you but it won't let anyone else open it, it's as if it's been sealed by kido…" She grinned and waved the items at him as if trying to tempt him. "Not that I would try and open a book addressed to you, sir." She said mischievously, the grin growing wider.

"A book and letter sealed with kido and addressed to me?" Toushiro's face looked neutral but his eyes lit up with curiosity. "Pass that over here, Matsumoto, I'll take a look then… I'm about due a break anyway." He cleared the work away from him toward the front of the desk.

The Lieutenant walked around the desk to present the mysterious items; his uninterested expression was soon also broken as it became laced with confusion, he had briefly glanced over the envelope and noticed that the handwriting was unfamiliar to him; it was definitely not from any of the other Captains or Lieutenants, the handwriting didn't belong to the former squad 3 captain either. He did a double-take as he noticed a small detail. The envelope was dated from a few weeks after became captain, he assumed it must just be an undelivered congratulatory present from someone in Squad 3. "But why would it be sealed with kido?" He muttered to himself. He carefully placed the letter to one side on his desk as not to damage it as it appeared delicate and proceeded to attempt to open the book, but to no avail. He slid it to the opposite side of the desk and attempted to open the letter. The envelope seal snapped open with no effort what-so-ever "Oh, so it definitely was meant for me-"

"Read it, Taicho! What does it say?" Interupted Rangiku, trying to peek over the vertically challenged Captain's shoulder, pressing her breasts against his head.

"Matsumoto…." Toushiro growled to his subordinate due to the inappropriate behaviour.

"Sorry, Taicho." She giggled as she stepped back and bounded over onto the sofa, as the Captain started to read the letter to himself:

_For my dear friend Hitsugaya-Chan,_

_Congratulations on becoming Captain, I know you hate me calling you Hitsugaya-Chan but if you have ascertained this letter and the book along with it, it means that I am probably dead so it no longer matters what I call you anymore._

Toushiro looked up in shock and his heart skipped a beat in his mild panic, only one person referred to him using the suffix "Chan" and that was Momo, but she called him Shiro-Chan and she wasn't dead, she was injured in Squad 4's barracks still, but even so this was dated years ago. He tried to think, who else would call him that? When he could think of no other he continued on further.

_With this letter I am enclosing a diary which contains my confession; because you are important to me I wish to warn you in case it happens again. What is happening to me should happen to no other shinigami in the Seireitei, let alone any other soul within Soul Society. For you, to make things easier in my demise, I will write this diary about myself and include you in the tale I'm about to tell. After reading this you may need to pass on the story to the 12__th__ division or indeed Captain Commander Yamamoto to follow procedures. Less explanation is needed on your part and you can remain anonymous if you wish. This letter is in no way included in the story so if you wish you can destroy it or keep it my friend; I do not wish you to be in any trouble that might affect your newly acquired captain status._

_I have broken a vital law and demolished what was seen to be impossible, I've taken control of someone else's Zanpakuto and its destroying my soul as a result. _

_I don't know how long I have to complete this, so I apologise in advance if it remains uncompleted and I apologise for any inconvenience you have in trying to complete it, but I need you to know what has happened to me as you are the only person who has known me well enough to believe what is happening. _

_Your good friend,_

_Hokutan Akira._

Hokutan Akira, this name was familiar to him, but he didn't know why. He couldn't bring himself to put a face to the name, but for this person to have bound a letter and book to him, this person must have known Toushiro quite well… He stared at the words blankly, his thoughts cluttering his mind, no matter how many times he reread the letter it seemed to make no more sense. The script was messy but legible, like many of the shinigami and the Japanese was of a standard layout, nothing a Captain or Nobel would write. This really could be from anybody. Toushiro hated not understanding something as trivial as who a letter was from and realised he would have to ask his Lieutenant if he was going to find anything out. Surely Matsumoto, the biggest gossiper in all of Seireitei, would know _something. _And surely if Toushiro knew this person, Matsumoto should also have a grasp on who it might be; the two of them were unfortunately inseparable.

"Matsumoto, do you know any shinigami named 'Hokutan Akira'?" He asked hopefully.

"No sir, but the 3rd area in western Rukongai is called Hokutan though, a shinigami from there maybe?" she said gleefully, as if proud that she knew this.

"I gathered that much Matsumoto." He grumbled. He was becoming quite bothered that he couldn't remember this person; his memory had never failed him before. He scoured the letter for some sort of clue-

"What does it say on the back of the letter, sir?" She questioned, squinting her eyes at the letter from where she comfortably sat.

Toushiro flipped the letter, in scrawled handwriting was one sentence, and this one sentence caused a deep, icy shiver down the spine of the usually cold captain. The words were written in a menacing deep red, a red that had dried darker and he only knew of one thing that set like that, blood:

_The book will reveal all! Read it Hitsugaya-Chan, it is my dying wish!_


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2: The book.

Toushiro's former unimpressed expression twisted into a cold shock after seeing the reverse side of the letter. He dropped the letter onto the table and sat back deep into his chair in disbelief; someone who he had no recollection of had written him a letter as their dying wish. Toushiro became wracked with guilt at the thought of this… but why? for all he knew this could be a prank that someone, probably Matsumoto, set up.

"Is this some sort of joke, Matsumoto?" he snapped at his subordinate, he'd never known himself to forget anyone. He started to become angry at the thought that anyone would play such a joke on him to question his intelligence.

"No, sir, as I said before; Kira found them in the squad 3 barracks whilst clearing out. Would you like me to bring him here?" she said, utterly confused as to the anger rising in his voice.

"Yes, immediately." He growled " and when you do bring him here, bring along the squad 3 records of former and current members." She looked over at her captain, he was deadly serious. She had never seen him this angry before, he was normally quite calm and collected. "Yes, sir." She announced as she left the office and shot off towards the squad 3 barracks, she thought that this gesture of good will she had found escalated into far more ominous than she had expected.

Toushiro sat deep in thought trying to remember every close friend he had ever had. being a difficult child the only people close to him while growing up were momo and his granny. Matsumoto discovered his potential as a shinigami and his time at the Shino academy was so short, he couldn't recall making many friends there either. After the academy he joined squad 10-

This train of thought was getting him nowhere, he'd have to read the book to establish more clues and with the squad 3 barracks quite a distance away, Matsumoto wouldn't return any time soon. He reached for the leather bound book and placed it in front of him on the large cluttered desk, he looked up at his pile of paperwork, "if this is a joke, that'll be a nice punishment for her." the captain let out a small laugh at the thought of his lieutenants face when she was forced to sit and actually work for once.

He looked back down at the clasp on the book, when he had attempted to open the book before it hadn't worked, but there was no harm trying again. He pulled on the clasp and to his surprise; it snapped open with no effort what-so-ever.

He turned to the first page and it read:

_Name: Hokutan Akira_

_Rank: former unseated shinigami of the 3__rd__ division and - _

An ink blot was covering the end of the sentence, Hitsugaya wondered if it was a mistake or supposed to be covered up... due to the age of the book and how delicate the pages were, there would be no way to tell now. He re-read the sentence, and noticed the word former again and wondered in what context he meant this. He continued on and hoped to find more clues.

_The tale I am about to tell is one that started many years ago when I first came to Soul Society. When I arrived in here I started off my life in the western rukongai with my identical twin brother, Takeshi. We came to reside in the 3__rd__ district, Hokutan, and adopted this as our family name as we had no recollection of anything other than our names from when we were alive. We resided there for a few years, trying our hardest to fit in with normal society as best we could, it was difficult for our neighbours to get our names right because we looked so alike._

Two things caught Toushiro's attention. For starters he had grown up in the 1st area of western rukongai and members of this area had a somewhat of a snobbish view of anyone from lower areas; there would be no way he would know this person from prior to his own training at the Shino Academy. Secondly, it had never been heard of _Twins _becoming shinigami. According to the 12th squad's captain and head of the shinigami research institute: in the human world, identical twins are normally derived from the same egg and it was theorised that because of this, a soul is split in half to form two identical looking humans. This split would cause the two souls to be incapable of generating any spiritual force, if they were able to by some means, it would be so insignificantly small that they would not be able to materialise a working zanpakuto between them.

He flicked through the next few pages quickly looking for some clue as to his identity, he saw parts of sentences such as "_we would eat fish every day to fill the hunger-_" and "_we didn't make friends easily-_" until he came across a word in the middle of a sentence that caught his eye, a word that will forever been acknowledged in soul society to be evil.

'_Aizen-Taicho."_


End file.
